Continuation Part 11: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[bolint]

This is not very bright. If they set Naruto to play at 9.26 and then ran right out to commit murder/hang out with Toto you would expect them to have very clearly remembered doing so and having their stories off pat. It points to innocence that they couldn't remember.

There is no proof that they set Naruto to play at 21.26.
And their not claiming it is fully compatible with not watching it.

 

[Numbers]

Yes I think you are correct. I suspect all the testing was done in fact, whatever the available records state - the confirmation for blood, the semen, the downstairs stuff. It's reasonable speculation because Stefanoni's prepared to hide that which assists the defence. So test everything and admit only that which helps you. The doubt that's then created, which should be for the benefit of the defence, goes instead to the prosecution. Machiavelli account goes even further than that. He says even a confirmatory test for blood can only prove it's there; it can't prove it's not - and that's circumstantial evidence for guilt - mad, mad world.

Pretty much agree. Test everything, present only items that can be presented in an incriminating or ambiguous manner (i.e. compatible with guilt), and hide everything else. Then deny, deny, deny, and if all else fails, blame others. This procedure is actually in Steph's lab manual.

Also, the creative cheating with regards to DNA:
Rely on contamination of the bra clasp and the alleged knife blade sample.
Hide the multiple profiles of males on the bra clasp; degrade the DNA on it after testing by improper storage, so no retest is possible.
Experience quantification equipment "malfunction" so the Qubit can be used; then interpret "too low" to mean there is DNA present when there can be use of contamination, otherwise do not test the "too low" since it means no DNA is present.
Hide retests done on the bra clasp and the knife blade sample. One needs to test carefully until contamination occurs, then report that as probative.
Invent new and non-validated and not fully reported methods to test the LCN DNA that is actually contamination.

 

[Numbers]

Thank you, it is the first time I see this whole report (if it is the whole report).
So far only some newspaper excerpts were available for me.

But it is weaker than I thought.

Simply there is no proof in it that Naruto was actually started.
Only an "ultima apertura" metadata time stamp. Which is a simple last access, not necessarily made by a video player. Could have been simply a P2P download access.
No surprise it does not appear on the VLC recently viewed file list where it naturally should appear if it had been played by VLC. OK, it could have been played by another player, but which one is it? What is on the recently watched file list of that player?

This expert report is a double edged weapon, anyway.
If we accept that the Amélie on the recent file list is the one that was played on the evening of the murder, then it also proves that they did not watch anything on VLC except the five copies of Stardust and it could be anytime after Amélie, not necessarily that evening. And they seem to be, as Massei wrote, just looking into several downloaded copies rather than actually watching the full movies.


As for the keyboard activity it is ridiculous to believe that they were busy to press the keyboard every few minutes to keep it active.
From the early morning data we see that the keyboard gets inactive as quickly as 4 minutes.

Were not they leisurely eating the dinner late at night with Raffaele's hands bloody of the fish?
Or were they having all night sex while regularly pressing the keys?

There was a reason that Hellman skipped this report.

The most likely reason was that he did not want to embarrass the police.
There is an obligation to admit evidence from the defense according to Italian law (CCP 190) and the Italian Constitution (Article 111). It is also a violation of ECHR Article 6.3 not to admit defense evidence.

 

[carbonjam72]

If the judges are to believed, then kindly pick an issue

The most likely reason was that he did not want to embarrass the police.
There is an obligation to admit evidence from the defense according to Italian law (CCP 190) and the Italian Constitution (Article 111). It is also a violation of ECHR Article 6.3 not to admit defense evidence.

I didn't see it so much before, but I notice it now. They pro-guilt crowd views the convicting judges as fair and rational, and Hellman as biased and corrupt.

The pro-innocence crowd view the situation exactly reversed.

The test of these competing views ought to be simply by referring to the motivation reports issued by the various judges. And compare the arguments.

Despite many 'pro-guilt' posters here and elsewhere claims as to the unreliability of Hellman, and the wisdom of all contrary judicial reasonings, I don't recall the 'pro-guilt' folks actually posting direct quotes from these convicting motivation reports in support of their arguments, OR printing quotes from Hellman to support their rejection of acquittal.
Maybe Mach, Bolint, Tsig, Couldsdon, GrifM, Vibio (of recent meritorious translating fame) or others, would take any issue they feel Hellman got wrong, and any of the convicting judges got right, and cite specifically the arguments in the judicial opinions that support their belief.

I'd settle for any of them, Matteini, (forget his name, Richardie?), Micheli, Massei, ISC reversal, Nencini, or any of the Guede judges. Really, take any issue of import, or claimed import. Anything at all.

(Let's put aside the fact that many of the convicting judges are actually incompatible with each other on many specifics, let's just see how they (any one at a time) stack up against Hellman, in their own words).

I think it would be a fascinating exercise. Or is it too much trouble to offer proof more definite then, "I have a feeling...", "those eyes", "that behavior", etc.

 

[Machiavelli]

See this paper:


S. Tobe; N. Watson; Nic Dae´id – “ Evaluation of Six Presumptive Tests for Blood, Their Specificity, Sensitivity, and Effect on High Molecular-Weight DNA” - (2007)

The Hemastixs reagent strips reacted with the 1:10,000 dilution by first causing a color reaction with the filter paper. The filter paper changed to a green color where the Hemastixs was pressed within a few seconds. The actual Hemastixs took between 30 and 60 sec to register a reaction. Eighteen Hemastixs were positive for +25 erythrocytes; the remaining seven registered positive for +80 erythrocytes.

Hemastix is the name of the most sensitive TMB Bayer product. This test needs to turn out green or blue within 60 seconds in order to be considered positive. This limit is reached at about a dilution of 1:10.000 of liquid blood, considered to be about 430 -500 erythrocytes per microliter. The test does not turn positive on dilutions of 1:100.000: at that concentration, the TMB swab, if used directly in contact with the dilution, requires between 1m45s and 2 minutes.

There were no previous literature values for the sensitivity of Hemastixs although the package claims to be able to detect blood in urine down to 10 erythrocytes, which equates to between a1:100,000 and 1:1,000,000 dilution factor (Table 1). This is consistent with the results obtained in this experiment, although the strips should be read at 60 sec and a reaction was not observed on the strips until between 3 and 4min after initial application to the stain

What is interesting is that the TMB test does not reach a practical sensitivity of a 1/100.000 blood dilution. This dilution equates to 45/50 blood cells per microliter. So it is not true – as opposed to what Tagliabracci says - that TMB would react with “only 5 cells”; moreover such assertion would make no sense because what matters is the concentration, that is cells per microliter. And this concentration is based on dilution of volumes of fresh blood in the actual sample; it is not the original concentration of the blood stain (that we can assume has a greater concentration).

The positive control of luminol reacted instantly with blood, giving a blue luminescence appearing at the site of the deposition; this persisted for over 1 min. The negative control did not react on addition of the reagent. Grodsky et al. (8) believe that luminol’s only serious disadvantage, other than interference, is its requirement of near or complete darkness in order to perceive the chemiluminescence.

A difference in light intensity of luminol is observed between diluted highly blood and whole concentrated blood:

The luminol reagent reacted instantly, with both the 1:10,000 and 1:100,000 dilution factors producing a blue luminescence. The luminescence lasted for close to a minute. However, both dilution factors were much less intense than the positive control of whole blood.

The same article finds out that bleach doesn’t react with luminol after 18h

Contrary to the literature findings, this study found that luminol only reacted with blood and the metal salts. Bleach gave no reaction, but this could be because the bleach solution was only 5% concentration, and that it was not tested right away but first allowed to dry for at least 18 h (..)

Kent et al. (20) noted that when bleach-treated blood is left for several days, the interference by bleach is diminished. (..)

Also, also several of the other false positive substances – like potato or horseradish – in fact do not react with luminol any more after a short time, or when dry, contrarily to blood:

This could once again be due to the substances’ drying time before testing (..) .

Luminol is actually MORE specific than TMB (Hemastix)

(..) Based on this, the best overall presumptive blood test in this study was luminol. It had the greatest sensitivity and specificity. It did not destroy the DNA, and it could be reapplied. Its only drawback is that it must be used in near or complete darkness. Leuchomalachite green was found to be as specific to blood as luminol, but its sensitivity was 10 times less, and it destroyed the DNA. Phenolphthalein had equal sensitivity to most of the other tests, but was extremely unspecific, and the amount of recoverable DNA is reduced when this test is used. HemastixTM [TMB] were easy to transport and use, were sensitive, but not very specific although specificity could be increased if the strips were looked at rather than the reaction on the stain.

The number of minutes within the reaction needs to be 1 or less for TMB to have a positive result. There is a list of substances reacting with luminol and TMB. In parentheses the number of positive results out of 25 samples. For example, tomato gave positive reaction to TMB on 23 samples out of 25; while luminol gave no reaction (“NR”). Red onion yielded 21 positive results to TMB. The same substances which react to luminol tand to be reactive with TMB, but not vice-versa:

Saliva - luminol NR - TMB 1 (3)
Semen - luminol NR NR
Potato - luminol NR - TMB 1 (25)
Tomato - luminol NR - TMB 1 (23)
Tomato sauce - luminol NR - TMB NR
Tomato sauce w/meat - luminol NR - TMB 4 (6)
Red onion - luminol NR 1 (21)
Red kidney bean - luminol NR - TMB NR
Horseradish - luminol NR - TMB NR
1M Ascorbic acid - luminol NR - TMB NR
Bleach solution 5% - luminol NR - TMB NR
10% Cupric sulfate - luminol 1 (25) - TMB 1 (25)
10% Ferric sulfate - luminol 1 (25) - TMB 1 (25)
10% Nickel chloride - luminol 1 (25) - TMB 1 (25)

According to this and other studies, basically Luminol does not react with anything but blood and products containing metal salts. Here Tobe found that bleach is “not reactive” to both luminol and TMB.
Tobe et. al. were not wearing any night- vision goggles, and they found out that luminol was far more sensitive and more specific than TMB.
But still, this is not enough.

The main point is that TMB is an indirect test. It does not react to a “concentration” actually as luminol does, but instead it reacts to an “absolute amount”: you need to pick up a sufficient amount of the agent, take it away from the stain, then dilute it again with the solvent that you will use for the TMB test, and than place the solution on the test swab, or moist the swab previously, or prepare the liquid TMB test in the testing tube, depending on what method is applied (whatever test, Hemastix or other brands or other manually prepared kits in the swab method or liquid in testing tube method).

 

[Desert Fox]

There is no proof that they set Naruto to play at 21.26.
And their not claiming it is fully compatible with not watching it.

Think about the planning and the effort of this

Amanda decides she wants to kill her roommate (reason still pending)
Barely speaking Italian, she gets Raff and Guede in on the "Plan"
Working on the perfect plan, Raff sets up a program to make it look like they watched Naruto. Raff is going to do this after knowing her a week.

After executing this perfect plan, does not even remember using it as an alibi.
They then manage to clean up ever trace of Amanda and Raff in the room except for a tiny sample on the bra clasp while leaving Guede's evidence all over the scene. After all that work, Amanda then does not remember to frame Guede alone. Instead, she frames her boss.

The whole story you are arguing for is just nuts.

Much easier is that Amanda and Raff were maybe a little high while scrambling each others brains. As such, memory lapse are explained.

Cops pushed too hard and got something kind of like a confession but not really.

 

[carbonjam72]

Think about the planning and the effort of this

Amanda decides she wants to kill her roommate (reason still pending) Barely speaking Italian, she gets Raff and Guede in on the "Plan" Working on the perfect plan, Raff sets up a program to make it look like they watched Naruto. Raff is going to do this after knowing her a week. After executing this perfect plan, does not even remember using it as an alibi. They then manage to clean up ever trace of Amanda and Raff in the room except for a tiny sample on the bra clasp while leaving Guede's evidence all over the scene. After all that work, Amanda then does not remember to frame Guede alone. Instead, she frames her boss. The whole story you are arguing for is just nuts.
Much easier is that Amanda and Raff were maybe a little high while scrambling each others brains. As such, memory lapse are explained.

Cops pushed too hard and got something kind of like a confession but not really.

I guess this really is the question to ask. Why can't they just be innocent? Why is it necessary to engage in mentally impossible gymnastics, just to avoid the most obvious, simplest explanation.

The police made a mistake. It happens. Why is it so hard for so many to face the fact?

 

[Machiavelli]

News from the Garlasco murder case

At the new appeal for the murder of Chiara Poggi, the Prosecutor General in Milan asks to sentence Alberto Stasi to 30 years, pointing out - among the main pieces of evidence - the fact that he "sistematically attempted to hinder the investigation"; especially through "systematic omissions":

http://www.rainews.it/dl/rainews/articoli/Delitto-Garlasco-procuratore-generale-chiede-30-anni-per-Stasi-9130d3a9-ab3e-4891-9b65-16a14a5e8a3a.html

http://www.ilsecoloxix.it/p/italia/2014/11/24/ARqozTfC-garlasco_ostacolare_indagini.shtml

http://www.quotidiano.net/omicidio-garlasco-1.430678

http://www.ansa.it/lombardia/notizie/2014/11/24/garlasco-stasi-ostacolato-indagini_e4a7dd2c-cd35-40fb-9775-3051bc20e1ef.html

 

[anglolawyer]

There is no proof that they set Naruto to play at 21.26.

The computer geeks here will doubtless tackle this. Milano's opinion, however, is that there was human activity at 9.26.

And their not claiming it is fully compatible with not watching it.

Even assuming you mean 'they are' and further that 'they' refers to the defence teams this sentence is obscure. Could you please clarify your meaning?

 

[Kauffer]

See this paper:


S. Tobe; N. Watson; Nic Dae´id – “ Evaluation of Six Presumptive Tests for Blood, Their Specificity, Sensitivity, and Effect on High Molecular-Weight DNA” - (2007)




Hemastix is the name of the most sensitive TMB Bayer product. This test needs to turn out green or blue within 60 seconds in order to be considered positive. This limit is reached at about a dilution of 1:10.000 of liquid blood, considered to be about 430 -500 erythrocytes per microliter. The test does not turn positive on dilutions of 1:100.000: at that concentration, the TMB swab, if used directly in contact with the dilution, requires between 1m45s and 2 minutes.



What is interesting is that the TMB test does not reach a practical sensitivity of a 1/100.000 blood dilution. This dilution equates to 45/50 blood cells per microliter. So it is not true – as opposed to what Tagliabracci says - that TMB would react with “only 5 cells”; moreover such assertion would make no sense because what matters is the concentration, that is cells per microliter. And this concentration is based on dilution of volumes of fresh blood in the actual sample; it is not the original concentration of the blood stain (that we can assume has a greater concentration).



A difference in light intensity of luminol is observed between diluted highly blood and whole concentrated blood:



The same article finds out that bleach doesn’t react with luminol after 18h





Also, also several of the other false positive substances – like potato or horseradish – in fact do not react with luminol any more after a short time, or when dry, contrarily to blood:



Luminol is actually MORE specific than TMB (Hemastix)




The number of minutes within the reaction needs to be 1 or less for TMB to have a positive result. There is a list of substances reacting with luminol and TMB. In parentheses the number of positive results out of 25 samples. For example, tomato gave positive reaction to TMB on 23 samples out of 25; while luminol gave no reaction (“NR”). Red onion yielded 21 positive results to TMB. The same substances which react to luminol tand to be reactive with TMB, but not vice-versa:



According to this and other studies, basically Luminol does not react with anything but blood and products containing metal salts. Here Tobe found that bleach is “not reactive” to both luminol and TMB.
Tobe et. al. were not wearing any night- vision goggles, and they found out that luminol was far more sensitive and more specific than TMB.
But still, this is not enough.

The main point is that TMB is an indirect test. It does not react to a “concentration” actually as luminol does, but instead it reacts to an “absolute amount”: you need to pick up a sufficient amount of the agent, take it away from the stain, then dilute it again with the solvent that you will use for the TMB test, and than place the solution on the test swab, or moist the swab previously, or prepare the liquid TMB test in the testing tube, depending on what method is applied (whatever test, Hemastix or other brands or other manually prepared kits in the swab method or liquid in testing tube method).

Are you clear which TMB test was actually used by Stefanoni? According to Dan, there is some suspicion that it wasn't the test in this study but the 2 part test? What do you know about this?

Secondly, if TMB is getting reliable results at higher dilutions after 60 seconds - in terms of sensitivity, what's the problem? You still need to proceed to confirmatory testing if it's positive anyway - these positive presumptive tests require confirmation with an antibody/antigen test. They cannot be relied on for unequivocal proof of blood, right?

Thirdly, how exhaustive were the interference tests? Only what's in the table? What about rusty water, which we can see leaking from the hall radiator at the cottage? What does the study say if anything about different kinds of bleach at different concentrations, if anything? What about soil and plant material, which Barni and Berti, the Carabinieri scientists cover in their paper?

I don't seem to be able to get into the main body of the text as you have, but do the authors say anything about a combination of presumptive tests being used at crime scenes - Luminol followed by TMB?

What do they say about the requirements for confirmatory testing?

 

[Planigale]

There is a 1) in your post but no 2)

Sorry! In a hurry to catch bus. Tried to go back and edit in some more numbers but appears too late to do so.

 

[Bill Williams]

Why is it that for the pro-guilt lobby, all exculpatory evidence is really a coverup organized by AK or RS?

There's now evidence found in analyzing RS's computer showing that the prosecution cheated - but wait, Raffaele cooked his computer that way to coverup his crime.

AK staged a break in, in exactly the manner even Judge Nencini admits is Rudy Guede's signature.

Even Machiavelli has AK being able to "choose not to sleep", so as to be able to fool interrogators.

Eventually it begins to look like the lobby has an agenda.

Can you think of more? Oh yes, the defence never asked for the EDFs.

 

[Kauffer]

Sleeping

Why is it that for the pro-guilt lobby, all exculpatory evidence is really a coverup organized by AK or RS?

There's now evidence found in analyzing RS's computer showing that the prosecution cheated - but wait, Raffaele cooked his computer that way to coverup his crime.

AK staged a break in, in exactly the manner even Judge Nencini admits is Rudy Guede's signature.

Even Machiavelli has AK being able to "choose not to sleep", so as to be able to fool interrogators.

Eventually it begins to look like the lobby has an agenda.

Can you think of more? Oh yes, the defence never asked for the EDFs.

Now now, Bill - you're going to set Machiavelli account off on the sleeping issue. Fully 40 hours up and a sexing and a manipulating and a stabbing and a murdering and a cleaning and a spinning stories. That's a helluva achievement. It's her supernatural energy that makes me feel so weary. I wonder what Vibio feels about it?

 

[Kauffer]

TMB 2 part test

I presume this is an example of the two part TMB test kit mentioned by LondonJohn and others - the proper test used by CSIs at crime scenes:

http://tritechforensics.com/store/product/tetramethylbenzidine-tmb-blood-test-kit/#readmore

This one is $42 - not expensive.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Bratton on false positives

Lt. Robyn Bratton of the Michigan State Police force wrote, "All luminol solutions can and do produce numerous false positive reactions. Opinions stating that a stain was blood because when he was sprayed with a luminol solution produced luminescence should be avoided!" A forensic worker wrote this about crime scene investigation, as is true of many of the citations PI commenters have been discussing. I provided the link earlier today.

 

[Samson]

Lt. Robyn Bratton of the Michigan State Police force wrote, "All luminol solutions can and do produce numerous false positive reactions. Opinions stating that a stain was blood because when he was sprayed with a luminol solution produced luminescence should be avoided!" A forensic worker wrote this about crime scene investigation, as is true of many of the citations PI commenters have been discussing. I provided the link earlier today.

Chris
My understanding of Planigale's post is that
1. It is unlikely to be blood as confirmatory tests would have proved it to be so and if such proof was available it would be used for unequivocal evidence by the prosecution.
2. However there are posters here who employ a hypothetical sensitivity gap between different tests to say it can not be totally ruled out as blood.
3. Secondary transfer between Rudy's direct imprints and Amanda's feet during her shower and activities would be consistent with this barely detectable possibility.

Thus everyone's theories can be accomodated.

I suspect there is a reason this is not plausible, as otherwise the discussion would have been concluded some time ago.
Any thoughts anyone?

 

[Numbers]

I presume this is an example of the two part TMB test kit mentioned by LondonJohn and others - the proper test used by CSIs at crime scenes:

http://tritechforensics.com/store/product/tetramethylbenzidine-tmb-blood-test-kit/#readmore

This one is $42 - not expensive.

The ABA HemaTrace card - the antibody/antigen test card - costs only about $4 or $5/card. Note that there are cards to test for semen as well as blood. See:

https://www.abacusdiagnostics.com/orderform.php#C

I believe that Stefanoni and the prosecution found out far more about the forensics of the case than the defense was told.

 

[Samson]

The ABA HemaTrace card - the antibody/antigen test card - costs only about $4 or $5/card. Note that there are cards to test for semen as well as blood. See:

https://www.abacusdiagnostics.com/orderform.php#C

I believe that Stefanoni and the prosecution found out far more about the forensics of the case than the defense was told.

Reading this thread it seems this is regarded as proved beyond doubt by many.

 

[Kauffer]

TMB

The ABA HemaTrace card - the antibody/antigen test card - costs only about $4 or $5/card. Note that there are cards to test for semen as well as blood. See:

https://www.abacusdiagnostics.com/orderform.php#C

I believe that Stefanoni and the prosecution found out far more about the forensics of the case than the defense was told.

That's interesting. The company publishes sensitivity data and there are also references given for specificity, if someone who can interpret this data would care to look

http://www.abacusdiagnostics.com/compare.htm#2

Hematrace sensitivity can be defended to 0.05 ug/ml. What does that mean in layman's terms?

 

[Machiavelli]

If this is such a remote and/or abstract possibility, why do crime labs routinely use TMB as the next step after luminol?

Your dispute is not with us. It is with the protocols and technologies used by crime labs throughout the world. Write your textbook, lay out your expertise, and get it through the peer review process. Then you will be better positioned to lecture us on forensic serology.

My dispute is with you, certainly not with scientific papers.
I'd remark this: actually I didn't happen to find any scientific article claiming that TMB should be a necessary second step after a luminol presumptive test.
Look at the abstract of the famous Webb, Creamer et al. :

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16645959

(...)Through the years, a number of articles have been published on the popular techniques of the day. However, there is no single paper that critiques and compares the five most common presumptive blood detection tests currently in use: luminol, phenolphthalein (Kastle-Meyer), leucomalachite green, Hemastix and the forensic light source. The present authors aimed to compare the above techniques with regard to their sensitivity, ease of use and safety. The luminol test was determined to be the most sensitive of the techniques, while Hemastix is a suitable alternative when the luminol test is not appropriate.

The authors called Hemastix one of the "most common" presumptive test (Hemastix is what they call "most common", not the liquidTMB + Peroxide test).
They do not call Hemastix a "second step", but instead a "suitable alternative".
Do you get the word alternative?

This is what actual literature says.
It's Webb & Creamer those who are lecturing, not me.